Vehicles are typically classified into different categories, such as passenger vehicles, buses and trucks of different sizes. Transportation agencies collect vehicle classifications to plan highway maintenance programs, evaluate highway usage, and optimize the deployment of various resources. There are many classification schemes, but the most common ones use axle counts and the spacing between axles.
Transportation agencies measure the weight of vehicles on roads and bridges in order to monitor the state of their repair, enforce weight limits, and charge vehicles fees based on weight criteria. Some agencies use vehicle weight data to predict damage that can be fixed by preservation, which is more cost-effective than rehabilitation. Today, this information is acquired at vehicle weigh stations. To adequately predict the state of repair requires many more weigh stations, which costs too much.
There are two basic kinds of weigh stations, static and Weigh In Motion (WIM). Static weigh stations employ bending plates, piezoelectric and load cell sensors to estimate the weight of stopped vehicles. They need substantial space along a road for measurement. The stations are expensive to install and staff. Every vehicle to be weighed must be stopped, wasting valuable time. This stoppage tends to create long queues of vehicles stretching past the station, which poses traffic safety hazards. The vehicles merging back into traffic after being weighed can cause accidents also.
WIM stations are replacing static weigh stations. Using the same sensors as static weigh stations, WIM stations estimate axle load while a vehicle is moving at highway speeds. They are also expensive and require frequent calibration as well as concrete pavement installed before and after the station.
Some unstaffed WIM stations use a camera to capture the license number or USDOT ID of any vehicle whose WIM measurements suggest it is overweight. These stations, which are referred to as virtual WIM stations, are also expensive and require frequent calibration.